Younger Cubans not a lock for GOP

MIAMI — Anton Fajardo voted for John McCain in 2008 but is now for Barack Obama.

Alex Toledo backed Obama yet likes Ron Paul.

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Juan Morales also voted for Obama and thinks he will again, but is keeping an open mind.

Three perspectives on the 2012 election with a common tie: Fajardo, Toledo and Morales are in their early 30s and of Cuban descent. Together, they represent an ideological shift that is altering Florida’s political landscape and may help decide the presidency.

A couple of generations removed from the exile experience of the 1960s, which created lockstep allegiance to the strongly anti-Communist GOP, younger Cubans are brandishing a more independent outlook.

“Any Cuban I know who is over 45 years will vote Republican no matter what,” Fajardo, 32, said in Miami Beach. “I think my peers will vote as I do, whoever they think is the best candidate.”

The race between Obama and Mitt Romney is expected to be a repeat of Florida’s 2008 election, in which Obama’s victory by less than 3 percentage points proved that no advantage or weakness among 1.2 million Cuban-American residents can be overlooked.

Obama captured 35 percent of the Cuban-American vote four years ago, more than any Democrat since Bill Clinton in 1996 and 65 percent of support from voters ages 18 to 29. McCain took 66 percent of the vote from Cubans ages 50 to 64 and 79 percent from those 65 to 74.

“My dad’s a die-hard Republican. He always brings it up saying, ‘You voted for Obama and the situation we’re in is all your fault,’” said Toledo, 32, who works at a marketing firm in Miami Beach.

It used to be enough for Republican politicians to sweep into Miami, sip Cuban coffee at Versailles restaurant and hammer on Fidel Castro to seal the Cuban vote that makes up about 70 percent of the Republican electorate in Miami-Dade.

But the younger generation, having assimilated into mainstream U.S. culture, is less motivated by those politics.

“I grew up thinking I was Republican, and it wasn’t until I started asking questions and not getting answers besides, ‘Oh because Kennedy betrayed us,’ that I started to change,” said Aimee Valera, referring to the botched Bay of Pigs invasion a half-century ago. Valera, who was born in Cuba, sought citizenship so she could vote for Obama and is volunteering for his campaign. She’s trying to convert her sister, who favors Republicans but “is leaning toward the Democratic side” because of women’s issues, Valera said.